Fucking contractors

The BBQ Pit
1

So I work in an undisclosed industry. I am the government client’s field rep. All of the field work at my site goes through me; I supervise it and am responsible for the quality of work done by the contractors. And I do have one good contractor, but the other one has steadily been going downhill.

And to that one, a hearty fuck you. Fuck you to the lame-ass incompetent construction manager who couldn’t be counted on to tell her ass from a hole in the ground. I knew I didn’t like women in construction (how ironic!) and you’ve done nothing to abuse me of that position. I told you to stay off that landfill because it was too wet and you’d damage the cap. Fine, you said. We’ll see how it is on Monday.

Y’know, it rained Sunday night. And what does rain usually bring with it? That’s right, you freaking moron, that would be water! And if I told you to stay off of it Thursday, what do you think I’m going to say on Monday? I’ll give you three guesses. I didn’t believe she had two brain cells to rub together, so I called her on Monday and specifically left a message. “It’s too wet, postpone the work.”

How was I to know that I was now talking to a cell phone that didn’t belong to anyone? That’s right, she’d given her notice two weeks before, two weeks in which I’d been working pretty closely with her scheduling this and other work. And not one word, not a mention of her pending absence, not a person to contact to fill in, nothing. Right after I talked to her on Thursday, she left the site for good. Nobody told me - none of the site personnel or the project manager who’s supposed to keep me informed. The government people had specifically told these idiots to keep me informed of field work changes because I am required to be present. Nope, these assholes ignored them too.

So today, I’m talking to another guy who has nothing to do with that project, and he casually informs me that the bitch had quit and the work had been done. It was at this point that the top of my head about blew off. I went up to my site, and sure enough, it was covered with ruts from driving equipment on it in the mud. I have no idea how they got by me, since I was up there that day, and all over the place.

I sent a scathing email uphill, talked to my boss, and we’ll see what’s going to happen. This is the lousiest, most incompetent fuckwad of a project manager that I’ve had the misfortune of working with in seven years at this job. He’s only good for doing cover-your-ass type of work, and he sure screwed the pooch on this one. Lie to and go behind the back of your mild-mannered client representative, will you? Hah! Let’s see if that company can pull their heads out of this one, because if they don’t bring me a new project manager out of this, they’re going to have a hard time finding work here in the future. I can’t fire them, but those who can sure do listen to me.

My only regret is that I’m just not as colorful with the swearing as some of y’all. Maybe I could get a little help here? I know some of you are truly inventive, and I could really use some good cussing about now.

2

Aw, gosh darn it all. Heck.

3

Daaaaaaang

4

Shoot.

5

Goat-felching is the adjective and adverb of the pit. Tell them that you’re pissed at this goat-felching fucktard going behind your back and over your head.

6

Just FWIW it’s “disabuse”. If you say “abuse” in that context, people will think you’re poorly educated, and even “disabuse” really doesn’t quite fit the context.

dis-a-buse (dis uh byuez’) v.t. <-bused, -bus-ing>
1. to free from deception or error.
Derived words
–dis a-bus’al, n.

7

It aint what you say it’s the delivery. When Betty White looks at the sheriff in *Lake Placid * and says “This is the part where if I had a dick I’d tell you to suck it!,” well that might be the best one-liner ever.

8

You have the best teachers in the world at your disposal, if you want to learn how to swear effectively and with variety. Just walk out on to a construction site and keep hidden for a while- you’ll hear it all.

9

Bah, thanks astro. I do actually know that, but I was so pissed that I couldn’t see straight, much less speak correctly. I think “disabuse” would actually work, since I had the notion that women in construction suck, and it’s probably not true, but I keep finding shining examples of suckage. It would be a competent woman to disabuse me of that, but that contractor does not hire them. It must be in their hiring policy.

“Job requirements: Must be able to pretend to competence while not knowing anything technically required to do actual work. Must be able to bullshit client into accepting piss-poor construction. Must be able to felch goat on short notice (goat not provided.) Ability to load documents with important sounding weasel words a plus. Salary depends inversely on experience.”

The Mad Hermit, yes, construction workers are pretty good for teaching average, everday cussing. Except most of them clean up their language when I’m on site, being the client rep and a woman and all. Still, I’m related to plenty that don’t hold their tongues, and I still say pit denizens are more creative. And they can spell too! (Mostly)

10

Am I the only person who saw the title of this thread and thought it was a rant aggainst prostitutes?

11

Or a rant *for * prostitutes?

12

I presume your aspect of what’s going on is to ensure that the landfill is capped in accord with proper environmental-protection standards? Probably the most scathing bit of rhetoric you could fling toward them has nothing to do with the sexual abuse of goats or the offal of warthogs dying of venereal diseases, but the simple words, “[Contractor GM’s name], what reasons can you give me why I should not recommend to my superiors that we bring in [competitor] to repair the mess you’ve made, at your firm’s expense and not the government’s?”

You do need to disabuse yourself of the sexism, though. Yes, there are incompetent women in construction – and incompetent men, and competent women, and competent men. The erection of structures and public works has not required the use of genitalia for quite a few years now; possession of the right set is not a job requirement.

I can recall two women that stand out in my mind in the construction industry. One was the widow of a D/B/A sole-proprietor GC who had worked with-and-for him for many years before his death, and kept the company going through some off years by a combination of acquired wisdom, business sense, and hardnosed ability to boss jobs combined with exquisite manners in office relationships. The other was a junior employee at the construction consulting firm I worked at – fresh out of college and working for her MBA. She was 23, had long blonde hair, a young, cute face, 38-D bosom and figure to match – and was the second-best person there at industry trends analysis and practical application of that difficult skill to the particular questions our clients needed answered. (Second-best because the man with 40+ years experience and a national reputation in his specialized field who trained both of us before retiring was, obviously, better – but she was head and shoulders above the men we worked with.)

13

So, did they lose a dick up there? What other reason would they have for fucking up the cap on a landfill? Surely they didn’t just want to try to earn money that they wouldn’t get paid and would have to pay out in damages as per the contract.

14

…Or as Polycarp eloquently said (simulpost.)

15

I know I do Polycarp. I’m a woman in construction myself, trying to do the best I can. I must be doing all right too, since they’ve kept me for so long. When I met this woman I was really hoping that she would be good at her job too, but she turned out to be really, really bad, and that gives us all a bad image. I’m glad she’s gone; I just wish she hadn’t left so much damage in her wake. I don’t much care for incompetence in either gender; her project manager (male) is as much at fault.

I will be suggesting the competitor as the recipients of the contract for next year, but sometimes we’re stuck with the lowest bidder. This is what happens when you go with the lowest bidder. I place a higher value on competence than the contracts people do, but I may have some small influence.

I have not used one curse or derogatory word in my official communications; I was just blowing off steam here because I care about what happens to my site. I also care that I was the one made to look like an idiot due to someone else’s dishonesty. Fortunately, my bosses know that and trust me.

16

I’m a woman and I work in construction (field engineering), and it pisses me off to hear from people who don’t like women in the field. It pisses me off even more when I hear it from another woman. Do you really need to declare that women can’t do any sort of job? This was obviously the case of one piss poor manager, and it had nothing to do with her gender.

I’ve only had issues with one contractor who had problems with me being a woman. I’ve worked with old-timers, new guys, the tops and bottoms of the totem poles. Only once have I ever heard that a woman shouldn’t be in the construction industry. You saying you don’t like women in the construction field reduces our position more than any one idiotic PM does. God knows there are enough of those. But hearing crap like that from a woman leads contractors to believe it’s true.

17

I didn’t mean to say that I don’t like women in construction. I know it’s an unreasonable bias that I’ve held because of certain idiotic individuals that I’ve met. All I have to go on is personal experience, which hasn’t been great. Yes, I’ve met plenty of incompetent men too. When I met this woman, I really hoped that she would be good. Maybe I shouldn’t have hoped for a higher standard than I’ve experienced in the past, but I really feel that she let me down regardless of gender.

You’re right; it wasn’t because of her gender, but I was mad and throwing things out. But of the times that I’ve been screwed in business, the three worst have all been at the hands of women, and that does tend to color my perceptions.

And where did I declare that women can’t do any sort of job? I’d be mighty hypocrytical to come up with a blanket statement like that. I did say that that one particular woman did nothing to improve my impression of the competence of the women I’ve worked with.

So take that one sentence out of my so-pissed-I-couldn’t-see rant. That leaves me pissed at an incompetent boob who went behind my back, and her management that enabled it. I’m still pissed; pissed at myself for assuming that they would do the job right and pissed at them for doing it wrong and lying about it.

18

New York State competitive bidding specifications have a standard clause to the effect that the contract will be let to the “lowest qualified bidder,” enabling them to reject a bid from a firm that has screwed the pooch on previous contracts. I’d be very surprised if California didn’t have similar language.

19

As one government person to another -
Wait until this contractor tries to bill you for the work performed, whether it is a progress payment, DD250, whatever your payment vehicle is. Then have your ACO/PCO turn it down as Unauthorized Work. Then, hit them again for inadequate staffing and lack of proper control, and istituted a Corrective Action Request or its equivalent. You see, Uncle only has to pay for work that was authorized, and if the end result is crap - due to incompetence or the old “we don’t have the people” or “our one person left and was not immediately replaced” then Uncle doesn’t have to be nice. When a contractor signs up to do a job, that is a contract which includes such things as adequate personnel levels, personnel competence and proper planning. Lack of any of those is Nonperformance and could be called breach of contract.

20

Fair enough. And I was communicating badly with the line that said something about women not being able to do any kind of job. What I meant to say is that women can do anything, and we shouldn’t prevent them from doing or assuming that they can’t do any particular job, no matter what it is.

I’m a little sensitive about the subject, having gone to talks by women who were the first in their fields doing engineering. There was one particular woman who had been duct taped to a toilet by her male coworkers who didn’t like a woman doing chemical engineering. Her story has made me really appreciate what the women who came before me (and I assume you) went through to get us in the position that we are in now. Even though I haven’t gone through anything like that, I want to honor what the first generation of female engineers had to deal with.

No harm, no foul, Cowgirl Jules.